It's the end of the world as you know it – brought to you by a Gnome Mage with big balls of fire

Get Out of Jail, Free!

Apparently, Gnomer had a bit of a hectic weekend, and was unable to get a “monday” post under his belt. But never fear! Krizzlybear is here! I actually promised him via twitter that I would fill in for one of his posts.

Just a stipulation though. I am unable to talk about anything frost. That’s quite a tall order, since I am in love with the tree.

If you’re a fan of this blog, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Gnomeaggedon, Larísa, and I have a very civil, yet quite exciting rivalry going on between gnomish mages. A battle of the specs, if you will. And with every new patch, and every new change that comes to our class, the battle ebbs back and forth like the tides on a beach. With patch 3.3, all three specs received some pretty awesome changes and buffs, in both PvE and PvP. If at all, I look forward to the ensuing battle.

But let’s leave that for another day. Gnomer was busy this weekend, and as a diplomatic frostie, I will perform an act of kindness and bail him out today by writing this post. And what else could be more adequate to talk about than the new LFG system?

Looking For Awesome

The other day, my mage, Bashertin not only received the title of “the Patient” but also the perky pug pet. The achievement associated with these rewards are called [Looking For Many] and [Looking For Multitudes], respectively. To get both, you would have to use the LFG system to match yourself with 50 and 100 random people. Sounds like a monumental task, especially with the dreaded prospect of running into that failpug.

But if you really want the title and the pet enough, it isn’t as difficult as it is. There are several things that you should know that can help.

1. You do not necessarily have to group with 4 people each time.

If you’re the type who ends up in failpugs fairly often, it would definitely help if you had more control over the success of your group. If you enter LFG alone, it will take 25 pugs to get the pet. If you enter LFG with a guildie each time, it will take 34. If you go with two guildies, it will take 50 pugs. If you’re a tank or healer, running with someone of the opposite role that you know well will work wonders for the success of your pugs. It will take a little bit longer to reach that title, but you are less likely to fail.

2. Make yourself available as a role that’s in-demand.

If you’re capable of performing two or more between tank, healer, and dps, you queue much faster if you can also perform a role that’s in demand. If you make yourself available for multiple roles, you will be slotted in faster than if you only selected one particular job for the sole reason that you’re too lazy to do so otherwise. As a skilled tank or healer, you have arguably more control over the success of the group than you would as a a DPS.

3. Be Patient.

The title is named ‘the Patient’ for reasons other than having to put up with 100 potential noobs. Even though 100 random members sounds like a lot, it isn’t so bad if you stretch it out over the course of a longer duration. If you only use the LFG tool once a day, it will only take 25 days for you to get the title. People who already got the title early run the risk of forgetting to do a random heroic for a particular day. If you stuck to a once-a-day schedule to get your achievement, you have extra motivation to use LFG than you would if you were simply in it for the frost emblems. By letting your achievement run go longer, you have a more sustained enthusiasm for the PuG system, and will encounter fail pugs less frequently.

Do Not Pass Go. Do Not Collect $200

That said, I am quite glad that I was able to make a post for Gnomer. Perhaps one of these days, if Frost is the New Black ever shuts down for good, I may sell myself out to the fire mage and do fill-in posts should I ever feel like it. But that’s not gonna happen any time soon. Either way, I’m honored to be able to post here, and I look forward to hearing from Gnomer again this week.

WoW Krizz, awesome post, and you open the door nicely for my follow up… Which will be along the lines of what I hate about the new LFG system… If only my iPhone WordPress app wasn’t swallowing my post on every save that would have been here instead of your awesomeness…

Squidly has had a ball with the new system. I am normally running with my tank of choice so the outcome is pretty much assured.

Gnomeaggedon came out of the closet last night (frock and all) for his 1st random LFG. He was topping the meters for a fair while, in the end the cobwebs on his keybinds got the better of him, but it was still nice to take the fireballing dps machine for a rub.

Wow! What a sneaky way to get an advantage in the battle! You’re infiltrating the blog of the enemy!

Why don’t you come and infiltrate the inn one day as well? Been a busy gnome lately, not much time for blogging as Christmas is closing in.

And grats on the pet!

BTW I’ve picked up a frost offspec! But since you haven’t had any Frost 101 post lately, I checked out your armory and copied your spec. I hope it was a good one! Now if I can only figure out some good spellrotations… Or is it just frostbolt forever and let your element have some fun?

@Lar: deep freeze only works during fingers of frost, so be sure to shatter-combo that deep freeze, or if lag is a bit of an issue, use the second charge for deep freeze. other than that, spam frostbolt all the way! remember to cold snap icy veins during heroism so you can use it again!